Police, security personnel, and similar persons in authority often rely on non-lethal weapons to restrain dangerous individuals. These devices, including batons, stun guns, and tear gas, are powerful enough to incapacitate without actually killing. Additionally, non-lethal weapons are the best way to subdue violent suspects without unnecessarily jeopardizing the public safety.
There is presently a need for incapacitating devices that are more powerful and far-reaching than the simple stick-type baton that can be used to place suspects in custody without endangering nearby civilians.
U.S. Pat. No. 5,529,300 to Frazier attempts to solve this need with a self-powered extensible projectile launching police baton. The device in Frazier relies on a source of gas under pressure to forcefully extend a blunt knob toward a suspect, or alternatively, to launch projectiles at the suspect.
The problem with the prior art is that it cannot reliably subdue a violent suspect. The blunt knob embodiment only operates at very short distances, while the projectile embodiment takes too much time to load and reload and also endangers nearby civilians.